Ah, my friend! in what school have you acquired such fatal skill in tearing the heart of an offender? Why, under an appearance of self-reproach, do you convey the bitterest maledictions? Why, with looks of idolatry and accents of compassion, do you aim the deadliest contempts and hurl the keenest censures against me? "You acquit me of all shadow of blame." What! in proving me fickle, inconsistent, insensible to all your merit, ungrateful for your generosity, your love? How have I rewarded your reluctance to give me pain, your readiness to sacrifice every personal good for my sake? By reproaching you with dissimulation. By violating all those vows, which no legal ceremony could make more solemn or binding, and which the highest, earliest, and most sacred voice of Heaven has ordained shall supersede all other bonds. By dooming you to feel "an anguish next to despair." Thus have I requited your unsullied truth, your unlimited devotion to me! By what degrading standard do you measure my enjoyments! "In my mother's tenderness and gratitude; in the affluence and honour which her regard will secure to me," am I to find consolation for unfaithfulness to my engagements; for every evil that may befall you. _You_, whom every hallowed obligation, every principle of human nature, has placed _next_ to myself; whom it has become not a fickle inclination, but a sacred duty, to prefer to all others; whose happiness ought to be my first and chief care, and from whose side I cannot sever myself without a guilt inexpiable! Ah, cruel friend! You ascribe my resolution to a disinterested regard to your good. You wish me to find happiness in that persuasion. Yet you leave me not that phantom for a comforter. You convict me, in every line of your letter, of selfishness and folly. The only consideration that has irresistible weight with me--the restoration of your father's kindness--you prove to be a mere delusion, and destroy it without mercy! Can you forgive me, Henry? Best of men! Will you be soothed by my penitence for one more rash and inconsiderate act? But, alas! my penitence is rapid and sincere; but where is the merit of compunction that affords no security against the repetition of the fault? And where is _my_ safety? Fly to me. Save me from my mother's irresistible expostulations. I cannot--_cannot_ withstand her tears. Let me find in your arms a refuge from them. Let me no more trust a resolution which is sure to fail. By making the tie between us such as even she will allow to be irrevocable, by depriving me of the power of compliance, only can I be safe.